FBI discussed removing Trump

by New York Post

15th Feb 2019 4:58 AM

The former acting head of the FBI says there were conversations about using the 25th amendment of the constitution to remove Donald Trump from office.

Andrew McCabe, who was fired from the Trump Administration, made the extraordinary revelations as he confirmed that Deputy Attorney-General Rod Rosenstein also offered to wear a wire around the president.

McCabe spoke to 60 Minutes in the US for an interview ahead of the release of his book, The Threat: How the FBI Protects America in the Age of Terror and Trump.

Journalist Scott Pelley appeared on CBS show This Morning to discuss his interview with Mr McCabe in which the former FBI official told him about the efforts to figure out "what to do" with Trump during the eight days between the firing of then-FBI Director James County and the appointment of special counsel Robert Mueller.

"There were meetings at the Justice Department at which it was discussed whether the vice president and a majority of the Cabinet could be brought together to remove the president of the United States under the 25th Amendment," Pelley said.

"And the highest levels of American law enforcement were trying to figure out what to do with the President."

Pelley said that Mr McCabe told him that Mr Rosenstein offered multiple times to wear a wire in meetings with Mr Trump.

The New York Post reports that Mr McCabe said he launched counterintelligence and obstruction of justice investigations into Mr Trump and his possible links to Russia after speaking to the commander-in-chief about his firing of Mr Comey.

US President Donald Trump and former FBI head, James Comey. Picture: Getty

Mr McCabe, who was fired by then-Attorney-General Jeff Sessions in May 2018, said he wanted the probes documented so that they couldn't be scuttled without raising red flags.

"I was very concerned that I was able to put the Russia case on absolutely solid ground in an indelible fashion that were I removed quickly and reassigned or fired that the case could not be closed or vanish in the night without a trace. I wanted to make sure that our case was on solid ground," Mr McCabe told 60 Minutes in an excerpt of the interview that will air Sunday.

"And if somebody came in behind me and closed it and tried to walk away from it, they would not be able to do that without creating a record of why they'd made that decision."

Mr McCabe said he was "troubled" by the conversation he had with Mr Trump.

"I was speaking to the man who had just run for the presidency and won the election for the presidency and who might have done so with the aid of the government of Russia, our most formidable adversary on the world stage. And that was something that troubled me greatly," said Mr McCabe, who was named acting director after Mr Trump fired Mr Comey in May 2017.

The next day, he launched the probes.

"I met with the team investigating the Russia cases. And I asked the team to go back and conduct an assessment to determine where are we with these efforts and what steps do we need to take going forward," he said.

This article originally appeared in the New York Post and is republished here with permission